I would have to concur with the sentiments that a article like this and its content is in bad taste.
It is juvenille and promotes ill will among players. Granted the mechanics are in the game, but the tone whether posted in jest or with some level of sarcasm is none the less sickening to read. I find it in poor taste to write an article, and even have it posted on this site, obviously meant to cause player anomosity in poor taste. It pokes fun at the CoC prodding that you can bend the rules to harass you opponents by playing a deck meant to frustrate ones opponents. Having NO win condition in the hopes that a player quits out of frustration is truely low.
I for one would hope that this article is retracted immediately.
Storm definitely has the potential to be good due to the enablers and its synergy with Suspend, but I guess I try to avoid it because I don't want the temptation of being cute. If you value Storm too highly, and you see a few suspenders and a Warrens in your hand, you may try to hard to suspend things on the right turns to setup a big storm while ignoring a stronger play to setup your board. If you can use it without becoming single-minded, then more power to ya. I guess seeing that much emphasis on it made me think you might be too focused on a storm deck, rather than a good deck that happens to run Warrens.
You're right that Feebleness vs. Elemental probably didn't matter, but at least you could have robbed some decent removal from someone in Black. That early in the draft and with Sudden Death in your pool, it never hits to have some more Black cards in case Red takes a bad turn.
Well done overall, though. You ended up with a very strong deck.
I think I value storm so high now because if it works in the three pack format it is very powerful.
Again though this is a very bad habit that I have picked up, and I am trying very hard to not let my habits dictate what I do anymore.
As for feebleness v wall, I'm not sure it really mattered, but I was sure I had a better chance of playing the wall at least out of the board. I want to avoid black as much as possible.
Grats' on winning. Much better draft than the last one. The first pick was pretty close between Djinn, Baloth, and Death as they all cut their respective colors fairly well, and Sudden Death is a reasonable pick there. I'm not sure why you value storm so high, though. It was really good in TTT due to the probability of multiple Warrens, Stokers, etc, but I don't see it being very relevent in TPF.
I agreed with you on most of the essential picks. There were just a few that I would have done differently:
Feebleness > Flamecore Elemental: with so much bounce out there, I'd hate to be playing a big echo guy without Haste
Sage of Epitr > AEtherflame Wall: he sets up your first few draws and just might get a few beats in before big stuff starts dropping.
Keldon Marauders > Merfolk Thaumaturgist: I would never pick Thaumaturgist that high. In your tempo-y deck, Marauders will likely hit for 5, making it easier for your evasive guys and burn to finish the job.
It's a nice FCC (five card combo) that uses Night of Souls's Betrayel, Forbidden Orchard, Tainted Æther, Burning Sands and Crucible of Worlds. Same concept, higher mana curve. I also use Guiltfeeder as a finisher. It's a good concept but very, very slow and it takes forever to set up.
I also occasionally run a Mono White prision variant that uses Static Orb, Orb of Dreams and Lodestone Myr with Hokori as a backup. That'll also get you blocked quite often.
Good article, but could have covered some of the less explored terratory like milling, or things like Timesifter.
Maybe I did look a little too much into it but even in a satirical manner I can't stand something that purposefully makes the game unfun. If that is a soul purpose for a deck I think it shouldn't be built =/ just my opinion
Much of the article is written in a rather satirical tone. Perhaps it wasn't as obvious as I thought; if that is the case then I sincerely apologize. But my point is, any remarks that you may have perceived as being offensive were entirely intended on my part to be harmless, slapstick comedy. Exaggeration is in abundance.
In any event, I don't equate poor sportsmanship with playing decks that are "mean". I would equate poor sportsmanship with bombarding your opponent with trade requests during a tournament, or just leaving the game hanging because you are losing.
The decks in this article are by no means perfect. They are vulnerable to disruption, as all combos are. Certainly, they are not unbeatable. Simply put, they are no different than any other of my creations; they just happen to center around a diffrerent style of play (resource deprivation). Playing these types of decks is not poor sportsmanship, it is simply one of literally thousands of avenues of play.
Again, if the satire did not stand out to you, I apologize, and it's probably my fault. Please understand that I do not support poor sportsmanship at any level of play, in any game or sport.
Looking aside from the writing which is ok not great...
Im very disappointed that this article would even get posted... Such a deliberate attempt to promote bad sportsmanship is just astonishing this is a card game if you really get upset with what someone does on this game you need to quit and grow up. Building a deck should be about you having fun the fact that these decks aim to make people mad astonishes me.
I don't know, the sort of person that would willingly do this sort of thing disturbs me and I frankly don't wanna be associated with them... not matter how absurd the reason for it is. It takes a huge leap back for mankind to just accept this sort of behavior.
Hmm... the over abundance of white spaces is distracting in my opinion. The first deck was refreshing, but I have seen the second decks many times before.
Just on that first deck, I've tried making Oversold Cemetary decks before, and I think tha tyou don't have nearly enough creatures to cause the effect to trigger at all consistently.
I liked the picks overall, however, did disagree with pack 18, I woulda picked the dreamscape, although brute force is not BAD there, and your philosphy that blue is about evasive beats... I mean, they are, but I feel like the primary reason to run blue is card advantage and selection, like foresee (woulda been my pick), and counters (you have a choice to stop any given spell), and all-around utility (bounce for example, can make a teamblock on your strong creature a disaster, set them back on lands if they stumble, remove key blockers, etc). There were no points I woulda actually TAKEN a counter, but I just wanted to point out those things.
This draft went very smooth, and thankfully I have a disposition to not playing black as it already is. I know it is weak in Future Sight, and I do not want to have to try to split the good black between me and a few other people. I'll fight for the blue and white in FS because it is very deep across the common level.
Of course, this draft went well, but there are a few coming up that are absolute wrecks.
Very nice draft. I like the first pick even though you had to go away from black it was the right pick and you made a good read going UR.
Actually the only pick I disagree with you on this draft is skipping the forsee over the second drake, and that is more a preference pick. Forsee has been an outstanding card for me so far.
Yeah clearly pick 1 was wrong the Kavu is possibly the best uncommon in Time Spiral. Not to mention passing that bomb and picking a red card could hurt you pack two. (Though I've never found signalsto work well in 4-3-2-2s.)
That said dispite kicking yourself about white you probably should have also gotten into black. Black was clearly open after then Tendrils wheeled.
As far as commnet calling for more hate drafts, that is incorrect. Hate drafting is one of the worst things you can do in draft as there is a 1/7 chance you'll play that card round 1. Take a sideboard card for you deck before hate drafting something better.
On khirareq's comments, Acid Moss is not that playable. I run it maybe 1 in 5 drafts I have one and I don't pick it often (and never high.) LD isn't that good in format as most decks have a solid mana base and while it accelrates you it costs 4 mana to do so and doesn't fix your mana. As far as the two white cards in Future Sight, they are decent but shouldn't be high picks. I consider both of them 6th-12th picks ideally.
I think you should have done more hate picks instead of just filling up your colours. Some of your picks were just bad (but you recognised them all). Mvonwuli and Nantuko shaman are too slow in my oppinion (regarding the shaman i only mean that in comparison to the cavalry) and what your deck really lacks is EVASION.
I think this is going to be a good learning expirence for myself. I'm honestly still learning the MTGO interface (I've mainly played constructed in the years that I have been there.) and I have let my limited skills diminish over time because of how much of an emphasis I put on constructed.
As I think we can see, I still have a lot to learn in drafting this format.
as for the shaman, I think he was too heavy into green for me to consider him. One of my biggest habits is I far to often let my opening picks dictate what I continue to draft. I have the fear of switching colors, and this has led to many poor situations, you know the ones, where you are struggling to find the 23rd card because you were dabbling in four colors.
I think acid-moss does not do enough in the format. I also think that Field is a higher pick than cry, however, if you are in an aggro deck, than Cry is the better pick.
I am sure that I will never pass a Kavu again. He's splashable, he's powerful, and he is a huge body.
I think as I have continued to draft I have gotten a better hang of this, and soon the goals of this series will become reality.
Good job on the article Josh. Even if you don't have perfect picks it lets us learn from your mistakes without having to fork out 3 boosters and 2 tickets.
I think you nailed it with your own comment at the end,
this draft deck could have been a lot different if you had taken the kavu first pick, and gotten into white.
You didnt get any decent white in PC but that's probably because the person you passed all the goodness to took it.
Also, IF you had been in white and had taken the 2 benalish knights I think Celectial Crusader would have been better than the Ivory Giant. With Shade of Trokair and Knight of the Sursi in FS you can still get plenty of suspend guys, and the combat/flash trick of crusader would have been huge on your 2/2 flanking guys.
I am by no means an expert. Let me try to help with the first couple picks as the rest of the draft is hard to predict after changing picks.
Pick 1 : You nailed this pick right on, after the fact. In my opinion, the only two cards to consider here are the Kavu and Tendrils. Kavu is a card you will almost always splash for making it the easy pick. The general rule is to pick bombs and then removal and I wouldn't consider EtW a bomb. When you could draft triple Timespiral I could see building your draft around multiple EtW's.
Pick 2: Once again I like your revised pick here. The cards to consider being Isolation, Outrider, Sliver and Syphon Mage. Once again I prefer to not get color committed and choose the versitile removal in the Isolation.
Pick 3: Looter is the top pick here. However given that an aggresive white 2 drop is available to pick and backs up the Isolation I like the Cavalry.
Picks 4,5 your revised picks look good also. Pick 6 I would go with the Cannoade that you originally picked.
Anyway that is my initial reaction. My best advice would be to weigh heavier on removal early in the draft. I think it is a good sign that you are able to go back and analyze and choose what would have been best. The next step is utilizing that the next time you draft.
...and I agreed with your assessment of what went wrong. I have a couple of questions, though.
Pack 1 Pick 3 - I would have taken the Nantuko over the Cavalry, even having taken the Isolation in Pick 2. In my experience, the free beater is quite strong. Is that the right call? Does it require too heavy a commitment to green this early? Is the Cavalry just better?
Pack 1 Pick5 - I had a tough time here deciding between the seekers and the dryad. The seekers is in my primary color and searchable by a Scout should I find one (unlikely at this point.) The dryad is evasion and card advantage, but with a heavier color commitment. What's the pick?
I keep seeing late Mwonvuli Acid Moss. Why is that? Does LD and Accelleration not work in TSP draft?
Marshalling Cry and Luminthread Field were coming around late too. Which is the higher pick?
I think to get the strongest build out of 5 packs of core set boosters, you usually have to go 3 color, with an occasional lucky pool that's deep enough to go 2 color. In the 4 week leagues on Magic Online, I recently won 1st place in a 9th edition league where I started out white/blue with a splash of red, and in week 3, with 7 boosters, I was able to cut the splash and go two color for higher consistency.
The next league I entered with the boosters I'd won, I had a much weaker cardpool and started out 1 and 7 with a green blue build I made. Then I decided to experiment, since it couldn't matter much at that point, and made a build with 6 mountains, 6 islands, and 6 swamps, with my strongest spells from each of those colors. It went 11 and 1, and I managed to win 2 boosters in the end! Yes, you lose consistency and get more color screw, but in a weak cardpool, the higher average quality of the spells you're playing is well worth it.
In this pool, I would leave out the Naturalize and Acid Moss, those are sideboard cards, maybe add red - and definitely put in that Phyrexian Hulk, he's a fatty who's never held back by colorscrew problems! If I ran into a deck with a lot of little flyers, I might sideboard into a red/blue/green build. If you draw that levitation and some green fatties, his air assault is shut down. Orcish Artillery is a minor bomb in any deck that has enough mountains to support the double-red cost, too.
This is definitely a format where you NEED to be able to deal with artifacts (duh!) and enchantments.
Very good to lay that information to peoples' heads, without ways to deal with potentially problematic enchantments you should shuffle=up and leave that match. The Hondens can be devastating and are a MUST to deal with. And, as you pointed out, your graveyard is a VALUABLE resource; Leyline of the Void stops that strategy, you must be able to deal with it as well when it rears its ugly head.
For my 3 drop in White, I run stonecloaker... graveyard hate as well as gating... amazing.
My 4 drop is the Morphy Daru guy who blows up enchantment when he's turned face up... as well as my 4-drop green Nantuko.
I do recommend running at least one way to deal with a land or you may find yourself in a sticky situation with that as well.
I would have to concur with the sentiments that a article like this and its content is in bad taste.
It is juvenille and promotes ill will among players. Granted the mechanics are in the game, but the tone whether posted in jest or with some level of sarcasm is none the less sickening to read. I find it in poor taste to write an article, and even have it posted on this site, obviously meant to cause player anomosity in poor taste. It pokes fun at the CoC prodding that you can bend the rules to harass you opponents by playing a deck meant to frustrate ones opponents. Having NO win condition in the hopes that a player quits out of frustration is truely low.
I for one would hope that this article is retracted immediately.
Storm definitely has the potential to be good due to the enablers and its synergy with Suspend, but I guess I try to avoid it because I don't want the temptation of being cute. If you value Storm too highly, and you see a few suspenders and a Warrens in your hand, you may try to hard to suspend things on the right turns to setup a big storm while ignoring a stronger play to setup your board. If you can use it without becoming single-minded, then more power to ya. I guess seeing that much emphasis on it made me think you might be too focused on a storm deck, rather than a good deck that happens to run Warrens.
You're right that Feebleness vs. Elemental probably didn't matter, but at least you could have robbed some decent removal from someone in Black. That early in the draft and with Sudden Death in your pool, it never hits to have some more Black cards in case Red takes a bad turn.
Well done overall, though. You ended up with a very strong deck.
I think I value storm so high now because if it works in the three pack format it is very powerful.
Again though this is a very bad habit that I have picked up, and I am trying very hard to not let my habits dictate what I do anymore.
As for feebleness v wall, I'm not sure it really mattered, but I was sure I had a better chance of playing the wall at least out of the board. I want to avoid black as much as possible.
Maruader v Merfolk may have been an oversight.
Hi,
Grats' on winning. Much better draft than the last one. The first pick was pretty close between Djinn, Baloth, and Death as they all cut their respective colors fairly well, and Sudden Death is a reasonable pick there. I'm not sure why you value storm so high, though. It was really good in TTT due to the probability of multiple Warrens, Stokers, etc, but I don't see it being very relevent in TPF.
I agreed with you on most of the essential picks. There were just a few that I would have done differently:
Feebleness > Flamecore Elemental: with so much bounce out there, I'd hate to be playing a big echo guy without Haste
Sage of Epitr > AEtherflame Wall: he sets up your first few draws and just might get a few beats in before big stuff starts dropping.
Keldon Marauders > Merfolk Thaumaturgist: I would never pick Thaumaturgist that high. In your tempo-y deck, Marauders will likely hit for 5, making it easier for your evasive guys and burn to finish the job.
I run a deck I call Tainted World.
It's a nice FCC (five card combo) that uses Night of Souls's Betrayel, Forbidden Orchard, Tainted Æther, Burning Sands and Crucible of Worlds. Same concept, higher mana curve. I also use Guiltfeeder as a finisher. It's a good concept but very, very slow and it takes forever to set up.
I also occasionally run a Mono White prision variant that uses Static Orb, Orb of Dreams and Lodestone Myr with Hokori as a backup. That'll also get you blocked quite often.
Good article, but could have covered some of the less explored terratory like milling, or things like Timesifter.
Hey, welcome aboard!
Maybe I did look a little too much into it but even in a satirical manner I can't stand something that purposefully makes the game unfun. If that is a soul purpose for a deck I think it shouldn't be built =/ just my opinion
Dreager,
Much of the article is written in a rather satirical tone. Perhaps it wasn't as obvious as I thought; if that is the case then I sincerely apologize. But my point is, any remarks that you may have perceived as being offensive were entirely intended on my part to be harmless, slapstick comedy. Exaggeration is in abundance.
In any event, I don't equate poor sportsmanship with playing decks that are "mean". I would equate poor sportsmanship with bombarding your opponent with trade requests during a tournament, or just leaving the game hanging because you are losing.
The decks in this article are by no means perfect. They are vulnerable to disruption, as all combos are. Certainly, they are not unbeatable. Simply put, they are no different than any other of my creations; they just happen to center around a diffrerent style of play (resource deprivation). Playing these types of decks is not poor sportsmanship, it is simply one of literally thousands of avenues of play.
Again, if the satire did not stand out to you, I apologize, and it's probably my fault. Please understand that I do not support poor sportsmanship at any level of play, in any game or sport.
I welcome your comments, positive or otherwise.
- Nick
Looking aside from the writing which is ok not great...
Im very disappointed that this article would even get posted... Such a deliberate attempt to promote bad sportsmanship is just astonishing this is a card game if you really get upset with what someone does on this game you need to quit and grow up. Building a deck should be about you having fun the fact that these decks aim to make people mad astonishes me.
I don't know, the sort of person that would willingly do this sort of thing disturbs me and I frankly don't wanna be associated with them... not matter how absurd the reason for it is. It takes a huge leap back for mankind to just accept this sort of behavior.
Just my 2 cents.
Hmm... the over abundance of white spaces is distracting in my opinion. The first deck was refreshing, but I have seen the second decks many times before.
Just on that first deck, I've tried making Oversold Cemetary decks before, and I think tha tyou don't have nearly enough creatures to cause the effect to trigger at all consistently.
I liked the picks overall, however, did disagree with pack 18, I woulda picked the dreamscape, although brute force is not BAD there, and your philosphy that blue is about evasive beats... I mean, they are, but I feel like the primary reason to run blue is card advantage and selection, like foresee (woulda been my pick), and counters (you have a choice to stop any given spell), and all-around utility (bounce for example, can make a teamblock on your strong creature a disaster, set them back on lands if they stumble, remove key blockers, etc). There were no points I woulda actually TAKEN a counter, but I just wanted to point out those things.
This draft went very smooth, and thankfully I have a disposition to not playing black as it already is. I know it is weak in Future Sight, and I do not want to have to try to split the good black between me and a few other people. I'll fight for the blue and white in FS because it is very deep across the common level.
Of course, this draft went well, but there are a few coming up that are absolute wrecks.
Thanks for the good words.
Congratualations on the 3-0.
Very nice draft. I like the first pick even though you had to go away from black it was the right pick and you made a good read going UR.
Actually the only pick I disagree with you on this draft is skipping the forsee over the second drake, and that is more a preference pick. Forsee has been an outstanding card for me so far.
Anyway congrats again and keep up the good work.
Yeah clearly pick 1 was wrong the Kavu is possibly the best uncommon in Time Spiral. Not to mention passing that bomb and picking a red card could hurt you pack two. (Though I've never found signalsto work well in 4-3-2-2s.)
That said dispite kicking yourself about white you probably should have also gotten into black. Black was clearly open after then Tendrils wheeled.
As far as commnet calling for more hate drafts, that is incorrect. Hate drafting is one of the worst things you can do in draft as there is a 1/7 chance you'll play that card round 1. Take a sideboard card for you deck before hate drafting something better.
On khirareq's comments, Acid Moss is not that playable. I run it maybe 1 in 5 drafts I have one and I don't pick it often (and never high.) LD isn't that good in format as most decks have a solid mana base and while it accelrates you it costs 4 mana to do so and doesn't fix your mana. As far as the two white cards in Future Sight, they are decent but shouldn't be high picks. I consider both of them 6th-12th picks ideally.
I think you should have done more hate picks instead of just filling up your colours. Some of your picks were just bad (but you recognised them all). Mvonwuli and Nantuko shaman are too slow in my oppinion (regarding the shaman i only mean that in comparison to the cavalry) and what your deck really lacks is EVASION.
I think this is going to be a good learning expirence for myself. I'm honestly still learning the MTGO interface (I've mainly played constructed in the years that I have been there.) and I have let my limited skills diminish over time because of how much of an emphasis I put on constructed.
As I think we can see, I still have a lot to learn in drafting this format.
as for the shaman, I think he was too heavy into green for me to consider him. One of my biggest habits is I far to often let my opening picks dictate what I continue to draft. I have the fear of switching colors, and this has led to many poor situations, you know the ones, where you are struggling to find the 23rd card because you were dabbling in four colors.
I think acid-moss does not do enough in the format. I also think that Field is a higher pick than cry, however, if you are in an aggro deck, than Cry is the better pick.
I am sure that I will never pass a Kavu again. He's splashable, he's powerful, and he is a huge body.
I think as I have continued to draft I have gotten a better hang of this, and soon the goals of this series will become reality.
Good job on the article Josh. Even if you don't have perfect picks it lets us learn from your mistakes without having to fork out 3 boosters and 2 tickets.
I think you nailed it with your own comment at the end,
this draft deck could have been a lot different if you had taken the kavu first pick, and gotten into white.
You didnt get any decent white in PC but that's probably because the person you passed all the goodness to took it.
Also, IF you had been in white and had taken the 2 benalish knights I think Celectial Crusader would have been better than the Ivory Giant. With Shade of Trokair and Knight of the Sursi in FS you can still get plenty of suspend guys, and the combat/flash trick of crusader would have been huge on your 2/2 flanking guys.
Good luck with your next draft
I am by no means an expert. Let me try to help with the first couple picks as the rest of the draft is hard to predict after changing picks.
Pick 1 : You nailed this pick right on, after the fact. In my opinion, the only two cards to consider here are the Kavu and Tendrils. Kavu is a card you will almost always splash for making it the easy pick. The general rule is to pick bombs and then removal and I wouldn't consider EtW a bomb. When you could draft triple Timespiral I could see building your draft around multiple EtW's.
Pick 2: Once again I like your revised pick here. The cards to consider being Isolation, Outrider, Sliver and Syphon Mage. Once again I prefer to not get color committed and choose the versitile removal in the Isolation.
Pick 3: Looter is the top pick here. However given that an aggresive white 2 drop is available to pick and backs up the Isolation I like the Cavalry.
Picks 4,5 your revised picks look good also. Pick 6 I would go with the Cannoade that you originally picked.
Anyway that is my initial reaction. My best advice would be to weigh heavier on removal early in the draft. I think it is a good sign that you are able to go back and analyze and choose what would have been best. The next step is utilizing that the next time you draft.
...and I agreed with your assessment of what went wrong. I have a couple of questions, though.
Pack 1 Pick 3 - I would have taken the Nantuko over the Cavalry, even having taken the Isolation in Pick 2. In my experience, the free beater is quite strong. Is that the right call? Does it require too heavy a commitment to green this early? Is the Cavalry just better?
Pack 1 Pick5 - I had a tough time here deciding between the seekers and the dryad. The seekers is in my primary color and searchable by a Scout should I find one (unlikely at this point.) The dryad is evasion and card advantage, but with a heavier color commitment. What's the pick?
I keep seeing late Mwonvuli Acid Moss. Why is that? Does LD and Accelleration not work in TSP draft?
Marshalling Cry and Luminthread Field were coming around late too. Which is the higher pick?
I think to get the strongest build out of 5 packs of core set boosters, you usually have to go 3 color, with an occasional lucky pool that's deep enough to go 2 color. In the 4 week leagues on Magic Online, I recently won 1st place in a 9th edition league where I started out white/blue with a splash of red, and in week 3, with 7 boosters, I was able to cut the splash and go two color for higher consistency.
The next league I entered with the boosters I'd won, I had a much weaker cardpool and started out 1 and 7 with a green blue build I made. Then I decided to experiment, since it couldn't matter much at that point, and made a build with 6 mountains, 6 islands, and 6 swamps, with my strongest spells from each of those colors. It went 11 and 1, and I managed to win 2 boosters in the end! Yes, you lose consistency and get more color screw, but in a weak cardpool, the higher average quality of the spells you're playing is well worth it.
In this pool, I would leave out the Naturalize and Acid Moss, those are sideboard cards, maybe add red - and definitely put in that Phyrexian Hulk, he's a fatty who's never held back by colorscrew problems! If I ran into a deck with a lot of little flyers, I might sideboard into a red/blue/green build. If you draw that levitation and some green fatties, his air assault is shut down. Orcish Artillery is a minor bomb in any deck that has enough mountains to support the double-red cost, too.
Great article, Baron. It gives me a little more basis on how to build my deck.
Hattivita is right the recurring cadd like tribal lightning are a killer. I think he hit me 3 turns in a row with it yesterday.
This is definitely a format where you NEED to be able to deal with artifacts (duh!) and enchantments.
Very good to lay that information to peoples' heads, without ways to deal with potentially problematic enchantments you should shuffle=up and leave that match. The Hondens can be devastating and are a MUST to deal with. And, as you pointed out, your graveyard is a VALUABLE resource; Leyline of the Void stops that strategy, you must be able to deal with it as well when it rears its ugly head.
For my 3 drop in White, I run stonecloaker... graveyard hate as well as gating... amazing.
My 4 drop is the Morphy Daru guy who blows up enchantment when he's turned face up... as well as my 4-drop green Nantuko.
I do recommend running at least one way to deal with a land or you may find yourself in a sticky situation with that as well.
Gnawph if your going to offer constructive criticism you might want to say it in a nicer way.